


Biohazard Level Four

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, John saving them both, M/M, Molly being clever, Sherlock doing science, Viral Infection, Zombies, memories from Afghanistan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-18
Updated: 2012-11-18
Packaged: 2017-11-18 22:44:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/566103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two incidents seems isolated, but John knows otherwise. Headshots, a bloodborne pathogen, and reanimating dead in London.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Biohazard Level Four

John closed the street door behind him with a growing sense of dread. Rearranging the bags in his grip, he tapped his shoes off at the foot of the stairs. Tread lightly on the step, which developed a squeak as the wood warped more in the cold. He tested the knob on their door. Locked. Sherlock never locked up unless both of them were out for the day.

“Sherlock?” he called, resigning himself to a lost cause.

Noticing the raincoat thrown hastily over the arm of John’s chair and the stack of slightly dampened museum tour pamphlets on the kitchen table, he felt his fist clench at his side. It had rained hours ago during his lunch at the clinic. Sherlock texted him once before his final patient, requesting more milk (preferably skimmed since the bacteria culture in his buttermilk control rearranged the chaos of half-empty bottles on the uppermost shelf and pushed the new milk carefully away from a suspicious group had gone off the night before), but had been silent since then. Binning said Petri dish, John cardboard box.

New tea went into the cupboard along with the loaf of bread. John checked his mobile again. No new messages. He sat heavily in his chair. Before he was able to get comfortable, he felt hard plastic digging into his hip. After the last attempt to watch game shows on BBC Two, resulting in a fuss over the identity portion where neither team guessed correctly despite the “obvious shape of the outer ear, scarring from a fight at one of the band’s smaller shows at a pub, and the creasing along the elbow of his right shirt sleeve”, Sherlock threw the remote from where he fumed on the couch. It wedged itself firmly between the chair cushions. Although the volume needed time to adjust once the television set was on, John heard the distinct tonal quality of a somber news report. He leaned toward the set, phone clutched tight within his grip.

“Earlier this afternoon, an incident occurred in which, from witness accounts, a young man was approached, but rather than helping the gentleman in need, he responded with gunfire.”

On a street corner, standing before a church, the flashing lights of an armed response vehicle highlighted the female reporter. John felt the pit of his stomach drop.

“Local authorities are asking the public for their cooperation as the firearm used in the attack was lost in the confrontation. It is unclear whether the young man, Michael Milson, was in possession of a Firearms Certificate, or if illegal substances were involved. Both bodies were taken to St Bartholomew’s Hospital on West Smithfield after the unidentified man died on the scene and Mr Milson died following his fall from the kerb, sustaining a broken neck.”

Thumbs scrambling over the keypad on his phone ( _So help me. You had better not be in that goddamn morgue_ ), John fought back the chills running up his neck as the camera focused on a cluster of teenagers.

“I don’t get it,” an acne ridden girl drawled, dark eyes unblinking. “He just unloaded on the sod. All in the head. He looked sick and a bit mad, but he didn’t deserve that. No one does . . . .”

Thankful he thought to keep his shoes on, John struggled to his feet once more. Considered slipping his handgun into his belt. Thought better of it. He forced himself to breathe through the onslaught of memories (sand, a medical facility, blood under fingernails, gaping mouths), switching off the television. His mobile chimed and he nearly dropped the phone in his haste.

_Of course. An interesting case arose. Molly granted me access to the bodies. —SH_

He swallowed, throat tight. Double-checking for the keys in his jacket, he rushed to the stairs — doubled back to shut the street door more firmly — to hail a taxi, cursing his abominable luck and shorter stature. Nearly two minutes. A cab idled before him. John gave the address to Bart’s and sent a response to Sherlock before he even managed to close the door behind him.

_Get Molly. Have her lock the morgue. Don’t let anyone in. Stay in the lab. I’m on my way._

—————

Sixteen minutes. £12.10. Conflict avoided when the receptionist recognised John from his voice, berating Sherlock over the phone. Waving him on, she resumed her business. In the background of the call, through the poor signal and the slight echo of the lab, John could hear Molly as if pressed to Sherlock’s side, speaking into the receiver.

“I locked up but I d— hear anyone com— It seems a bit. Dange— get in?”

“Really, John, this is absurd. Why— perfectly well that— blood samp— before.”

John ducked near a window in the hall. “Just listen. Please. I’m losing the call. Stay put. I’m nearly there. Have you got gloves on at least?”

A crackly response filled with affirmatives and complaints. The sounds of a stool scraping against the floor, Molly asking and repeating a question, and white noise. John pocketed the phone, cursing to himself over the dropped call, and jogged down the hall to the only door with light visible through the window. He rapped on the glass, knuckles white. Sherlock’s deep voice echoed slightly before the door swung open, revealing him drawn to his full height, shoulders pulled back defensively.

“I hardly understand the necessity of this. We were perfectly capable of running our tests safely in the morgue. You _have_ seen me work in the flat before, yes?”

“This is different.” John cast a glance over his shoulder toward the morgue a few feet away. He told himself that was the shifting of Molly’s lab coat against her jumper as she rose uneasily from her seat. “You have to be— Jesus Christ . . . .”

Scattered across the table, surrounding the formidable microscope, were yards of data print outs, stacks of medical journals, an atlas, a box of empty pipettes, and multiple Petri dishes, slides, and syringes containing dark burgundy blood. Molly tugged anxiously on the wristband of her medical gloves. Cleared her throat. Looked pointedly at Sherlock’s hands. Gloved as well.

“Are you alright?” John grabbed Sherlock’s wrists, turning his hands over to view his palms and knuckles through the blue nitrile. Sherlock scoffed, trying to pull away. John reached for his chin, tipping his head back to expose his neck. Clean, unbroken skin. His breath left him in a rush as he repeated, “ _Are you alright?_ ”

“ _Yes._ ” Sherlock’s jaw clenched. “Why would I not be?”

“Positive?”

“Absolutely. Until you arrived I was making progress on the identification of an unusual configuration of blood cells present in both—”

John dragged Sherlock to him, crushing their lips together. Sherlock froze, arms trapped between their chests. A muffled gasp and the solid _thump_ of books falling to the floor. From over Sherlock’s shoulder, John registered Molly, ears and cheeks mottled red, stooping to collect several copies of _BMJ_ and _The Lancet_. He inhaled shakily and withdrew, feeling the frayed ends of his nerves repairing themselves.

“I appreciate the cloying concern,” Sherlock took a step away, their hands hesitantly clasped, herding him toward the worktable, “but we did think to wear gloves before beginning work with foreign bodily fluids.”

“They’re not fluids, are they?” John kept a careful distance from the capped syringe near a rack of test tubes. “How coagulated is the blood?”

Molly and Sherlock shared a fleeting look; she seemed concerned (and frankly, a bit undone as if still processing the sudden revelation of John and Sherlock’s involvement) while Sherlock was characteristically inquisitive. Still balancing the journals in her cradled elbows, Molly moved to the door. Peered through the window, breath fogging the glass slightly.

“There’s noticeable blood separation and fibrin thread formation already. Which is typical. But this is strange. There’s too much. Of both.” She turned quickly. “I mean— It’s almost as if his, their, bodies are decaying more quickly.”

John heard a nearly imperceptible murmur from Sherlock, which dissolved into pensive humming. Carefully adjusting the focus, Sherlock cocked his head. Waved John aside to take down more notes in his scrawling script.

“Both. Of both, you said?” The uneasy crawling along his skin returned.

“Right.” Dropping the majority of the journals on the table, she flipped through a backdated issue of _The Lancet_ before dog-earring a page. “When both bodies were brought in for autopsies, the paramedics assumed the, uh . . . .”

“The homeless man,” Sherlock sighed. “You owe him no respect due to the fact that he is, as established, dead.” 

“What about him, Molly?” John prompted.

She tented her fingers on the tabletop, glancing between both men. “The paramedics assumed the odor was from his . . . homelessness. But he had already begun to develop facial bloating and postmortem lividity. There are also signs of late stage rigor mortis.”

“As for the gunman,” Sherlock interrupted, switching off the microscope decisively, “he exhibits nearly all of the same characteristics in addition to incontinence and formation of ocular film. Since you seem concerned rather than frightened — I _can_ differentiate the responses of your sympathetic nervous system — would you care to inform us more on the subject?”

Pinned by the undivided attention, John slipped his hands into his pockets. Started at a sound from the adjacent room. Momentarily regretted arriving unarmed.

“Listen. This is worse than it seems. We have to keep this quiet.”

“What do you mean? Quiet. This seems like someth—”

“I’ve _seen_ this before.”

Sherlock raised an eyebrow, collecting his samples with more care than usual (John felt relieved that his fight-or-flight response had properly concerned him), looking over the vials once more before binning everything in the biohazardous waste container.

“How can you have? Unless . . .” he mused, eyes searching John’s face. Lingering on the pulse at his throat, his hairline, and the set of his jaw. “Oh, stupid. Afghanistan. Right. Medical facility at a small base. Had to have been. You were never there personally, but you knew others — knew _of_ others involved — and they failed to maintain confidentiality.” 

Molly pulled the open halves of her lab coat tighter around herself.

Sherlock continued unhindered by John’s silence. “What then. What year. If it were early in your deployment, you might have undergone denial, but this is thought suppression. Roughly early 2008 then, judging by your reaction. They failed to resist the attraction of external funding. Invited willing contributors. An accident occurred, but it was hardly isolated. If you were nowhere near the location of the incident’s genesis—”

“Have you been listening?”

He took in the overwhelmed frustration from Sherlock and Molly’s wide-eyed nervousness. Through the wall, in the morgue, a metallic clatter cut through their uncomfortable tension. Molly tugged on the fingers of her gloves.

“You locked the morgue, correct?” John kept his focus on the door.

Her voice was small as she responded, “Yes. I did. I checked twice.”

“Who’s in there?”

“The man who was shot and the gunman.”

“Therein lies the problem.” Sherlock leaned against the lip of the table.

“You do remember John’s first response—”

“Before he . . . kissed you.”

“Yes, Molly, keep up,” Sherlock conceded, rolling down his shirtsleeves, as John spluttered in dismay. “First priority is to examine for scratches, punctures, any sort of exposed wound. What does our gunman have?”

“Oh. His neck.”

“Right.”

“Oh, God.”

Sherlock shrugged into his suit jacket, turning to John. “I trust you brought the Browning.”

“Seemed a bit not good what with all the concern over our gunman.”

“It’s a bloodborne pathogen, then.” Molly toyed with the nitrile bundle in her hands before suddenly tossing the gloves to the waste. “Is there some sort of antivirus?”

“None that we found.”

As if effectively separating himself from the topic, Sherlock turned up the collar of his Belstaff. Checked his mobile. Made an unpleasant snorting sound and wrapped his scarf securely around his throat. Molly stood frozen until John laid a hand on her shoulder.

“We need to go. Now.”

“But, my purse.” Zipping into her coat, she rocked back onto her heels. “Your messages seemed quite serious. From what Sherlock said. I didn’t think about it. I left it behind by mistake.”

“Our . . . friend is still secured by the body bag in which he was deposited to us,” Sherlock offered. “If that comes as any small consolation. He’s not wandering about, blindly seeking sustenance in the dark.”

“I don’t understand.” She had pressed against the window once more, peering down the hall toward the entrance. Hands rising to the edge of her hood, Molly jumped at another sound from the wall. Like a collision with an overturned gurney. “How could he be ‘wandering about?’”

Scanning the perimeter of the room (fire extinguisher: weak metal construction capable of singular heavy blow, potential visual deterrent; steel pipe: sturdy iron capable of sustained usage and skull penetration, difficult to remove from lab stool), John rifled through cabinets. He could distantly hear Sherlock speaking to Molly. A steel storage unit sat unlocked in the corner, one door slightly ajar. Elbows deep in the midst of boxes of spare gloves, bulbs for the microscopes and overhead lamps, a first-aid kit, and an extra lab coat was a heavy, metal torch (emergency torch: beam used for disorientation; can be swung as a baton dealing sustained heavy blows). He tested the weight of the handle in his grip. Checked the battery chamber — full — and the bulb strength. Blinked as the beam reflected slightly off the uniform white walls.

Lungs tight in his chest and heart pounding, John rejoined the pair. Reached for the doorknob.

“Wait!” Molly’s thin hand covered his forearm. “John, how does this—this virus reanimate the dead? It makes no sense. Lack of oxygen supply and electrical activity in the brain should make it impossible to revive a person. How—”

“We don’t know. We never really figured it out,” John answered truthfully, hearing the emptiness of his own admission. “All we know is that it fries the brain. Intense fever. All internal organs shut down and decomposition proceeds. The only hitch is in the . . . return. Minimal motor function. Sensory intake. Only one vital human instinct remains.”

“The necessity to feed.” Sherlock’s head drew back defensively. John noticed he appeared more apprehensive, his eyes narrowed and lips thin.

“They’re not fast. Rigor mortis makes sure of that, but they have endurance.” He resented his role as the bearer of what could very well be their death sentence, but ignorance had killed capable men in Afghanistan. “They don’t need to sleep because they don’t tire. They have no heartbeat. No need to breathe. The only thing that slows them down is rough terrain, stairs. The only thing that kills is destroying the brain.”

“Gunshot.” Molly’s grip slackened. “The homeless man.”

“He’s dead. Again. Yes,” John agreed, “but the gunman isn’t. Breaking the spinal column doesn’t stop the spread once the virus is contracted. Infection breeds in the brain.”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Sherlock’s impatience cracked through the room. “The longer we stand here, the likelihood of someone entering the morgue are increasing at an alarming rate.”

Allowing himself one last glance down the hall, John ushered Molly from the lab, holding the door open as Sherlock slipped past. The trio hovered before the imposing door. It was difficult to ignore the interspersed clatter of the gurney and a persistent grunting. Solemnly, Molly produced her lanyard (a plastic keychain of a white, cartoon cat in a dress dangling from the metal ring), flipping through to the right key and slotting it into the lock. The door swung open silently. From the edge of the room, in the darkness, came a groan and the rustling of plastic.

Gripping the torch tightly, John felt for the light switch. Fluorescent bulbs flickered on weakly, surging with electricity and brightening the room suddenly. At his shoulder, he felt Sherlock lean forward. His chin nearly rested on John’s head to see more clearly. On one counter, by the sink, sat Molly’s purse. Curled on the floor at the other half of the room was their concern. It hissed, a dry rattling sound, from within the body bag and jerked as if fighting its confines. 

“Molly, get your purse and get out. Quickly.” John sounded harsh to his own ears.

“I have seen the dead before,” she reminded him, already ducking under his hand on the door. Purse clutched to her chest, she lingered by the sink. The body bag groaned. Seized. Molly gasped and jumped, retreated to the hall.

“I’m not leaving. Not now.” She paused, gaze resolutely fixed on the doors at the end of the hall. “You only have about thirty minutes before the cleaning crew comes through. I’ll keep watch.”

With Sherlock pressed against his back, insistent on entering the morgue, John adjusted his grip on the torch and inhaled a steady breath. Oxygen in. Carbon dioxide out. The door _clicked_ shut behind them. Finally in the room with the grotesque sounds of reanimated life, John crouched near the bag, torch raised over his head. Paper ripping. He spun on his good knee. Sherlock stood over the second gurney, a marker behind his ear, tearing pages from a notebook.

Inhale. Exhale. Inhale.

John turned back to the bag. Set his right foot firmly on what felt like a wrist. Raised his arm. Swung from the shoulder. A crack and a distressed groan. Ignoring the resurfacing memories (gunfire, a scream, blood around eyes and in mouths, the stench of death), he swung again. Again. Again. Bone gave way under the heft of the flared head of the torch. He swung once more for good measure. With a sickly squelching, the plastic formed to the shape of the crushed skull and sharp jaw of the second-dead corpse within. Dropping the torch, John felt his knees waver. He collapsed, bracing himself with arms locked behind him, palms clammy against the floor.

Silently, Sherlock hunched over the bag. Marker in hand, he scrawled on the surface before whirling past John with his sheets of paper. Pushing himself to his feet, John swayed slightly. Was able to read what Sherlock wrote.

_BIOHAZARD LEVEL 4 — DISPOSE OF IMMEDIATELY_

The same sharp black letters graced the second bag. From the sink, furiously washing his hands, John heard a knock on the door. Molly, then. He scrubbed at his hands.

“John?”

Soap long gone, the water was near scalding, but he couldn’t stop.

“ _John._ ”

His knuckles burned. His palms stung. He rinsed his hands again. Again. Again. Found himself shoved forcefully toward the door, hands dripping on the linoleum. Staring at his fingers, John barely noticed the sound of the faucet turned off and Sherlock’s shoes stopping before him. Hands lighted on his neck, thumbs tracing the edge of his jaw. Lips pressed to his forehead. Along his hairline. At the crown of his head.

“Molly’s becoming increasingly anxious.”

To his surprise, John was effectively placated by Sherlock’s stunted reassurance. He looked up slowly, judging the tightness in Sherlock’s face. Nodded. He remembered the torch, but before he moved toward the makeshift weapon, he felt himself guided from the room. Slowly, the white noise in his ears dispersed and he heard the lock engaged, the light turned off, and the rustle of paper. Clustered in the hall once more, John saw the note taped to the morgue window.

_BIOHAZARD LEVEL 4 — ENTER WITH CAUTION/ DISPOSE OF ALL HAZARDOUS WASTE_

“Are you . . .” Molly’s question dwindled and dissolved.

“I’ve seen my share of these poor bastards. It’s not something you quite forget how to do, but,” he heard himself say honestly, “I’m fine. It’s fine.”

Sherlock started down the hall, loping off toward the rear exit. “We should go.”

“How am I supposed to explain this . . . sort of thing?”

“Lie. Anything but the truth.” John put a hand on her shoulder, hurrying her along. Their time was nearly up and there was only so much they could go to avoid security cameras. “That’s how this all happened. Movies glorify it all. Going in with guns blazing, but it starts—”

Mobile out and texting furiously, Sherlock held out an arm. They pressed along the wall, hiding at the corner. A _ping_ from Sherlock’s phone and he waved them along. Edging past the camera, John watched the power light flicker back on once they passed. It seemed the British government was aware of the situation at hand.

“It starts quietly until it spreads,” he continued. “It takes time to incubate.”

“How long do we have?” Molly dug within her purse, trading her lanyard for her mobile.

“Who knows. Two incidents seems isolated, but it can _move_. Quickly. We can’t do anything just yet. I wish we could. But—”

“What happens then? I mean, when things go a bit . . . off, I suppose?”

At the end of the hall, near the stairwell leading to the street, they stopped. Molly and Sherlock looked to him expectantly. Mycroft was waiting as well, he assumed.

“Stay prepared.” He felt the pull in his stomach that comes from looking from a sharp drop. They were on the edge, waiting on the balance, of a natural disaster and there was no way to prevent its arrival. “Be ready to leave at any moment’s notice. Keep watch for signs. There had to have been other witness reports.”

“Abnormal pallor. Inhibited gait. Minimal vocal capabilities,” Sherlock listed calmly.

“If you hear about fights where someone was bitten or scratched or if someone fired shots all to the head, call us. Yes, Sherlock,” he sighed at the rigidity in the man’s posture. 

“Molly, you call us _immediately_.”

She worried the hem of her jacket. “What then?”

“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that—”

“If and when it does?” Sherlock sent a final message. Slipped the phone in his pocket.

John forced himself to consider the possibility. If London went spiraling into the chaos from the medical center, the damage would be unbelievable. Close quarters. Multitudes of people. Public locations where cleanliness was never certain. Hypochondriacs going to the clinic for every ache and sniffle. Sensationalised news. Hair-pin triggers. A regrettable stringency on gun laws.

Inhale. Exhale. “Grab supplies. Arm yourself. Build defenses. Worst case scenario? Run.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the October 2012 fuckyeahjohnlockfanfic supernatural contest.  
> Many thanks to houndingsherlock for being my beta reader, Britpicker, and fellow zombie enthusiast.


End file.
